Monday, March 31, 2008

All movie remakes are dreadful, but certain movies should never be remade, such as "Gone With the Wind", "Auntie Mame", "All About Eve", and "The Godfather". Now comes word that Madonna wants to remake "Casablanca" -- with herself as Ingrid Bergman, of course! What next, Britney Spears as Scarlett O'Hara?

Sunday, March 30, 2008

I saw a report on CNN last night that I mistook for a skit from "Saturday Night Live". It seems the Olympic Trials are coming to Eugene, Oregon, and the whole city is being made to take "sensitivity training" to deal with the black athletes. The CNN report mentioned having to learn hip-hop lingo and knowing where the local soul food eateries are. Doesn't this sound like a joke? By the way, these are AMERICAN athletes, so this seems even more insulting and ridiculous. Read more here:"The exact nature of cultural diversity training is still being worked out. But examples could include alerting visiting athletes to the kinds of restaurant foods, hair care salons or religious services that they might be accustomed to frequenting. 'We can tell people about Papa’s Soul Food Kitchen, but if they’re more into pan-Asian, we can let them know that Ring of Fire is right down the street,' Fincher said. 'We’re just highlighting what the community has to offer, not creating anything new.' Jones said another element of training will be about not making assumptions based on a person’s race — that every unfamiliar black person in Eugene, for example, must be a Trials athlete or supporter."

Friday, March 28, 2008

Before this is taken off every website by the politically correct or by the terrorists themselves, go immediately to Atlas Shrugs to see the Fitna film by Dutch politician Geert Wilders. This short, powerful film shows the evil of Islamofascism, for those morons who still don't get it. It should be aired on TV or on the Internet every week, just as the film footage of the September 11 attacks should be shown - a constant and necessary reminder.

Argus Hamilton notes: "Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was indicted over a mistress scandal Tuesday a week after New York's Governor Eliot Spitzer resigned over a hooker. It's inspiring. The Jewish former governor of New York and the black mayor of Detroit are forging a common cause that has not been seen since the civil rights marches of the Sixties."

Neal Boortz wonders: "In a post-9/11 world, the U.S. Government's Printing Office wouldn't really outsource the manufacturing of electronic passports, would it?" Sickeningly, the answer is yes. This is beyond outrageous. How is this being permitted?

Read Argus Hamilton's amusing take on the news, including this: "Hillary Clinton's campaign admitted Monday she misspoke when she said she was under enemy fire at a Bosnian airport twelve years ago. She just misremembered it. She was under enemy fire when her plane left Washington but not when it arrived in Bosnia."

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

This is a good article by Robert J. Samuelson about the actual state of our economy:

"Regarding the economy, it's hard not to notice this stark contrast: The 'real economy' of spending, production and jobs -- though weakening -- is hardly in a state of collapse, but much of today's semi-hysterical commentary suggests that it is. Financial markets for stocks and bonds are described as being 'in turmoil.' People talk about a recession as if it were the second coming of Genghis Khan. Some whisper the dreaded word 'depression.' Meanwhile, Americans are expected to buy about 15 million vehicles in 2008; though down from 16.5 million in 2006, that's still a lot. There's a disconnect between what people see around them and what they're told is happening. The first is upsetting (rising gas prices, falling home prices, fewer jobs) but reflects the normal reverses of a $14 trillion economy. The second ('panic,' 'financial meltdown') suggests the onset of something catastrophic and totally outside the experience of ordinary people. The economy, the New York Times said last week, may be on "the brink of the worst recession in a generation" -- an ominous warning. Perhaps, but so far the concrete evidence is scant..."

"Three generation of British adults known as the "Shameless" family are proud of the fact that they have never worked a day in their lives and live off of the government. Their excuse: they have too many children to look after. They are leaches who contribute nothing to society except government-educated ankle biters."

They shouldn't publicize this story in this country, otherwise it may give more Americans the same idea.

Monday, March 24, 2008

I love Best of the Web Today and all its sections. This is from the "News You Can Use" department : "Even Your Dog Has a Blog--headline, CNN.com, March 21". That story, with above photo, can be found here.

I never fail to be amazed by the ridiculous, contrived, hard-to-spell, and harder-to-pronounce names that people are given. Last night on the news, they showed a man with the first name of "Autowian". At the library a woman called out, "Shenandoah, where are you?", and even worse, it turned out to be a boy! Here's an item about some of the worst baby names.

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

This is a wonderful article by Curt Smith about Red Barber: "Insanity is said to be doing the same thing, expecting a different result. By that measure, today’s culture is insane. Increasingly, we rely on an ipod or video game to help think and learn. Lacking: a voice of sanity to fight deviancing-and dumbing-down. Recently, such a voice was hailed in Columbus, Mississippi, on the centenary anniversary of his 1908 birth. Walter Lanier (Red) Barber defined an age before cynicism, victim hood, and elbow-in-the rib scatology. Recalling it/him, we teach ourselves."

I never thought I'd ever read something like this: "In an emotional tribute to victims and survivors of the Holocaust, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday that the Nazi genocide 'fills us Germans with shame' and pledged to stand by Israel's side against any threat, particularly from Iran."

Monday, March 17, 2008

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Antisemitism is like the Energizer Bunny -- it keeps going and going and going. Crossing the Rubicon3 reports : "Does Anti-Israel = Anti-Jew? A newly released report says yes."

"New anti-Semitism disguised by hatred of Israel, report says. Jews worldwide are facing a new form of anti-Semitism disguised by hatred toward Israel, in addition to more traditional forms of anti-Semitism, a new US report said Thursday".

"Teen to sue school after teacher wakes him up in class. The 15-year-old boy says he suffered pain and "very severe injuries to his left eardrum" when teacher Melissa Nadeau abruptly slammed the palm of her hand on his desk to wake him up. 'He's a computer wizard who works late into the night, and that's probably why he fell asleep,' says the student's lawyer."

(He's lucky she didn't send him to the principal to get the rattan, which is what was used when I was in school!)

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Google must be a subsidiary of Reuters. Yid With Lid reports: "Somebody at Google Really HATES JEWS. Last month WND reported that Google Earth, described a town in Israel as land stolen from the Palestinians. Today it reports that if you search for Yiddish in Google Images it suggest to its readers that they try Zyklon B, the gas the Nazis used to kill Jews. I took a screen shot and you can see it above."

It must be very easy for anyone to become a pastor these days: "Sen. Barack Obama's pastor says blacks should not sing 'God Bless America' but 'God damn America.' The Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama's pastor for the last 20 years at the Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's south side, has a long history of what even Obama's campaign aides concede is 'inflammatory rhetoric,' including the assertion that the United States brought on the 9/11 attacks with its own 'terrorism.'"

Well, this has got to be the crime of the century: "Contraband candy has led to big trouble for an eighth-grade honors student in Connecticut. Michael Sheridan was stripped of his title as class vice president, barred from attending an honors student dinner and suspended for a day after buying a bag of Skittles from a classmate. I sure hope he has decent parents who will sue these idiots for everything they are worth! (heard on Neal Boortz' radio show this morning)

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

More obscene Reuters spin, reported by Little Green Footballs: "Reuters: 'Death to the Jews' is 'Pro-Palestinian'. Graffiti found in an El Al plane in Italy has led the airline to demand an investigation; Reuters reports that it was 'pro-Palestinian graffiti.'"

Monday, March 10, 2008

This is a touching and little publicized story: "As a survivor, Tom Canavan felt he had to witness the removal of the last sizable remnant of the World Trade Center: the staircase that served as an escape route for him and many others."

Eliot Spitzer, former New York Attorney General and now Governor, is being linked to prostitution ring. I wonder how the Dems will try to spin this one. Gawker has a great open letter to Spitzer's wife, but it could have been written for all the political wives who have been dragged out before the cameras to stand as a shield for their philandering husband. I can still remember the look on Lee Hart's face...

Saturday, March 08, 2008

Betsy's Page, which is a terrific blog, sums up the blocking of Clinton-era papers by remarking "How convenient". Between this maneuver, and the documents that jumped into Sandy Berger's socks, who knows what we will never get to see?

Every day I hear people complaining about gasoline prices, complaining about being dependent on Arab oil, blaming OPEC for high prices, and blaming President Bush and the evil Republicans for everything, period. My question is, if we have oil in this country, why can't we just drill for it? Are the environmentalist wackos and the Democrats so powerful that even the President of the United States can't overrule them? Is a snail darter more important than an individual? I looked up my question online. Here's what The Astute Bloggers says about it, among other things:

"Canada is drilling for oil right over the border from ANWR; their caribou don't mind; why should ours!? * None of the off-chore oil rigs leaked as a result of Katrina, so drilling off the coast of Florida is absolutely safe and clean. * And the UK and Norway have been drilling in the North Sea for decades - which is much rougher than the pacific off the coast of California, so there's NO EXCUSE for NOT drilling there, too."

Thursday, March 06, 2008

Two terror attacks today, this one in Times Square, and this deadly attack in Jerusalem. Israpundit reports: "Yitzchak Dadon, a student at the Merkaz Harav Yeshiva who fired the shot that killed the terrorist gunman, whose attack had left numerous students dead and critically wounded, stated in a radio interview, despite attempts to cut him off, that Peres had armed the terrorists and Olmert wants to give them even more guns."

"In Nova Scotia, Astrid Margaret Literski is locked in a battle with Revenue Canada over whether she is entitled to child tax benefit checks associated with her late daughter Eveleigh. Literski is incarcerated after pleading guilty to second-degree murder for killing the girl, then 4, in 2003. The tax agency says it wants back some of the money it sent Literski because it learned after the fact that the girl was actually living with her father, her primary caretaker, at the time."

Isn't this like the old joke about someone killing his parents, then throwing himself on the mercy of the court because he's an orphan?

Howie Carr has a good description of Mrs. Clinton. Is the media afraid to talk like this about Barack Obama?

"Hillary Clinton isn’t the new Comeback Kid. She’s the next Freddie Krueger. And the Pennsylvania primary may well be Barack’s Nightmare on the Main Line. We will have Hillary Clinton to kick around some more. Nobody wants to write the obituaries for the Clinton dynasty quite yet. This has been just too much fun, watching Hillary twist slowly, slowly in the wind. Because she is in so many ways the female Richard Nixon - unlikable, shrill, phony, stiff, self-pitying and more than a little shady. But when it comes to politics, she’s a regular Timex. Like Nixon, she takes a licking and keeps on ticking. The presidential election is like a soap opera, and in this next chapter, all the front-running bumkissers in the mainstream media who’ve been ripping her will now try to make their peace with the Clinton machine, by dropping to their knees. After 16 years, it’s a maneuver they’re quite familiar with."

Monday, March 03, 2008

Here is the winner of the Crackpot Celebrity of the Day Award: "Go Make Films Elsewhere, Then. Quel âne. Marion Cotillard has come under entirely predictable criticism for her moronic claim that the attacks of September 2001 might have been a conspiracy by property developers who couldn't be bothered to repair the cabling on the Twin Towers. The Oscar-winning French actress should have tried contrition, a dash of naivete, with the breathless delivery that won over the audience during last weekend's Academy Awards telecast. Instead: petulance about as charming as France's enduring resentment of those countries that liberated them twice in the last century."

I agree with Wizbang who discusses the trend of celebrities having, or adopting, babies: "This trend of celebrities having babies, or adopting babies, just because they decide they 'want one' disgusts me. Just because you are rich and famous does not mean you are ready and capable of caring for a child (hello, Britney Spears... ) -- like the ones who adopt or give birth to children without having any kind of stable family setting to give them. To celebrities, children are accessories -- just like having another dog to take care of. And when taking care of the kid is getting to be too much work, or they have a movie premiere to go to across the world, or if they want to go out and get obliterated every night at clubs across the country, they can just hand them off to their army of nannies and caretakers, standing by to take over when Mommy doesn't feel like it anymore."

Sunday, March 02, 2008

There are books I love at first read. This is one of them: "Blue Highways", by William Least Heat-Moon. This is one of those books I know I won't want to end. Today I read the following delightful passage. If you love words, you'll love this book, too.

"Had it not been raining hard that morning on the Livingston square, I never would have learned of Nameless, Tennessee. Waiting for the rain to ease, I lay on my bunk and read the atlas to pass the time rather than to see where I might go. In Kentucky the towns with fine names like Boreing, Bear Wallow, Decoy, Subtle, Mud Lick, Mummie, Neon; Belcher was just down the road from Mouthcard, and Minnie only ten miles from Mousie.

I looked at Tennessee. Turtletown eight miles from Ducktown. And also: Peavine, Wheel, Milky Way, Love, Joy, Dull, Weakly, Fly, Spot, Miser Station, Only, McBurg, Peeled Chestnut, Clouds, Topsy, Isoline. And the best of all, Nameless. The logic! I was heading east, and Nameless lay forty-five miles west. I decided to go anyway.

The rain stopped, but things looked saturated, even bricks. In Gainesboro, a hill town with a square of businesses around the Jackson County Courthouse, I stopped for directions and breakfast. There is one almost infallible way to find honest food at just prices in blue-highway America: count the wall calendars in a cafe.

No calendar: Same as an interstate pit stopOne calendar: Preprocessed food assembled in New JerseyTwo calendars: Only if fish trophies presentThree calendars: Can’t miss on the farm-boy breakfastsFour calendars: Try the ho-made pie, too.Five calendars: Keep it under your hat, or they'll franchise

One time I found a six calendar café in the Ozarks, which served fried chicken, peach pie, and chocolate malts, that left me searching for another ever since. I’ve never seen a seven-calendar place. But old-time travelers -- road men in a day when cars had running boards and lunchroom windows said AIR COOLED in blue letters with icicles dripping from the tops -- those travelers have told me the golden legends of seven-calendar cafes"

Saturday, March 01, 2008

This post at Free Republic asks a good question that I have been wondering about for years: "Radical Islam is growing in the US: where’s the American anger? It is very difficult to understand why Americans are not enraged at the thought of any radical Islamic movement, particularly in the United States. But, being unconcerned seems to be an understatement, for Islam is rapidly expanding in this country and there is already evidence that from evening prayer to the teachings of Islamic schools the tone is anti-American and anti-Christian."

InstaPunk has a very good post about Obama and his Teflon coating, via Cold Fury: "The first black President must be a politican, not a messiah. We've already seen what happens when teflon meets a halo. The halo wins. Without even being responsive. The truth is -- and this is not racist, but statistically valid -- that the first black president really can't coast unexamined into office; he has an absolute moral obligation to demonstrate with full candor and understanding that he isn't Marion Barry, Alcee Hastings, William Jefferson, Ray Nagin, or all the mayors of Newark, Detroit, and Philadelphia who have ridden the horse of jury nullification into sinecures of power only to abuse that power in systematic ways while branding all who objected to their corruption as bigots. What we cannot afford at this time in our history is a sainted Jimmy Carter, a well educated Huey Long, or a closet Castro. Inquire of yourselves -- again and again -- how did a neophyte take down the Clintons?"